by Cat Johnson
“She must have had the baby and given it up, as heart breaking as that thought is.” I could imagine Rose’s pain, having to hand over the one small part of Charles she had left.
It was a different time then. A girl her age couldn’t just choose to be a single mother. But I had to hand it to Rose, she lived a long, colorful life from what I knew from reading her diaries.
That thought gave me an idea.
“You know, we found Rose’s journals last year. They were stored in Agnes’s attic after Rose’s death. They span from about the same time of her letters right up until she died in two-thousand.”
“Really?” His eyes widened. “Did you read them?”
“Oh yeah. Harper, Red and I spent hours reading all of them.”
“And was there anything about Charles or the baby in them?” Brandon asked.
I shook my head. “No. That’s the strange part. Though maybe not. Maybe it was too painful for her to write about.”
He nodded. “I’d love to read them.”
“You definitely can. Harper scanned them all to make sure they were backed up in case the real things ever got lost or destroyed.”
“Who would destroy them?” he asked, frowning.
I remembered how many people had broken into Agnes’s house trying to get their hands on those secret-filled journals and let out a laugh. “You’d be surprised. But more than that, you’d be surprised how many houses in this town have been destroyed by fire over the years. And of course, floods. The actual paper journals fill an entire trunk, but I’ll send you the link to the files, if you want. That way you can read them digitally.”
“I’d love that. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. You should have them. You and your mother are her blood relatives. The only ones from her direct line.”
He reached out and squeezed my hand. “As sad as Rose and Charlie’s story turned out, it does make me realize one thing.”
“What’s that?” I asked, looking up at him as he stood and moved to pull me up and out of the chair.
“None of us should waste a second of the time we’re given together.” He rubbed his hands up and down my arms.
As I rested my hands on his chest, my focus traveled to his lips, before moving back up to his soulful gaze. “I agree completely.”
“Good.” That was the last word he said before his mouth covered mine.
We were in the bedroom in seconds. That was fine with me. We were still making up for the time we’d lost because of my foolish assumptions.
We’d had sex before, once last night and again this morning, but this time felt different. The intensity with which he pulled me close and claimed my mouth felt new.
The way he backed me toward the bed then pushed me down onto the mattress felt different.
And the way he wasted no time stripping off my clothes and then his own before he plunged inside me with no fanfare, no foreplay, was definitely different.
More serious. More meaningful.
It felt almost like good-bye.
That thought was silly. He’d be back. He owned the diner. He was in contract to buy Mudville House. There was no way I wouldn’t see him again.
But there was no denying something in him had changed. Yesterday, and this morning, he was a man who took his time. Who loved me with precision. Who missed no detail of my body.
I didn’t mind this determined, intense, passionate version of Brandon. Not at all.
Hovering above me, Brandon met and held my gaze as he plunged inside me. His eyes never wavered as he watched my face. I did the same with him.
I saw when the sensations began to overcome him.
Watched as finally his eyes closed, his chin dropped and his stroke intensified.
I couldn’t watch him anymore when my own eyes slammed shut as he drove me over the edge of pleasure and then followed right behind.
He still lay on top of me, gasping for breath, when he lifted his head. “I have to leave really early tomorrow. Like before sunrise.”
I stilled. “Okay.”
What was he trying to tell me?
He drew in a breath and I faced whatever he would say next with dread.
Leaning on his elbow so he could see my face, he said, “I think we’d better do this again tonight—maybe two more times—just in case we don’t have time before I leave in the morning. That okay with you?”
The breath I’d been holding whooshed out on a laugh as I felt silly for expecting the worst.
I smiled. “Yes, Brandon. That’s very okay.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
Brandon
“You’re here.”
I glanced up from my desk at Josh, hovering in my doorway and looking shocked.
“Yes. I told you I would be here when you arrived in the morning.”
“Did you drive home from upstate last night?” he asked.
“No, I left this morning.” At the crack of fucking dawn to get here early.
Leaving Bethany behind in bed was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do.
“Let’s have lunch. I feel like I haven’t really talked to you in forever. And I definitely want to hear more about this Muddytown where you’ve been spending all your time lately.”
“Mudville, and one weekend maybe I’ll drag you there. If only so you’ll learn the damn name,” I threatened. “But sure. We can have lunch. I actually have quite a bit to tell you.”
I was probably never going to hear the end of it when Josh found out the DNA test I’d thought was ridiculous had opened up a whole new world to me.
“I also need you to catch me up on what I missed here yesterday,” I continued. “Particularly the meeting. And again, I am so sorry.”
He dismissed my apology with a wave of his hand. “Don’t worry about it. You can handle the next one.”
The next one. I lifted a brow, realizing I hadn’t even looked at my schedule yet this morning. I really had to stop relying on Mina to make sure I was where I needed to be.
“And when is that scheduled for?” I asked.
“This Friday afternoon.”
My first thought was crap. I’d been hoping to cut out early Friday and head upstate.
That was followed by my second thought—that I wanted to be in Mudville. Not here. I already missed Bethany. Hell, I missed it all. The people. The buildings. Even that damn Muddy River and my stray diner cat.
That was swiftly followed by my third thought, which was one word. Fuck. Because what the hell was I going to do about wanting to be there when my life and my work was here?
I wrestled my attention back to my partner and the company that was my livelihood.
Wrestling my focus back to work was harder than it should be. I managed it and said, “We’re meeting again so soon?”
We’d been touching base with the candidate personally only monthly up until now.
“We’re getting closer to the election. The nomination will be determined in like days, and our guy isn’t a shoe-in any longer,” he pointed out.
“You’re right.” That didn’t mean I was happy about it.
Josh glanced at his watch. “I’ve got a conference call in five. But how about we schedule a chat at the top of the hour? I can brief you on everything then.”
I nodded. “Sounds good.”
That was a lie. Chatting about meetings didn’t sound at all good. In fact, it was the last thing I wanted to do.
I sighed. It was going to be a long week.
Josh had just left when a text came through to my cell.
A smile settled on my lips when I saw Bethany’s name and a thrill zinged through me.
One thing I hadn’t anticipated when I left her this morning after making sure she had my cell number, was how happy I’d be when I received her first text.
I opened the text and leaned back in my chair to enjoy reading it.
BETHANY: Here is the link to Rose’s journals. Hope your drive was good.
It was signed
with a smiley face, which coincidentally looked very much like my own face at the moment, I was sure.
Still grinning like a fool, I punched in a reply.
BRANDON: Thank you so much. Drive was good . . . except that I was driving away from you.
I blew out a breath and stared at my response, my finger hovering over the button to send it.
It was too soon to send something like that to her, regardless of how I felt. And yeah, I felt. All sorts of things. Things I’d never felt before.
I didn’t even want to think about how it was definitely too soon for that too.
Second-guessing myself, I deleted the last half of the final sentence, ending it instead with a smiley face of my own before I hit send.
I had work to catch up on, but because I was truly becoming a Mudville real estate hoarder, no doubt deserving of an intervention or at least a reality television show, I decided to take a look at the real estate listing for Rose’s house on Second Street again and see if I could make an appointment to see it this weekend.
That reminded me of Rose and her journals, which led to me opening the file Bethany had texted me the link to, just to see what these writings were about that had all three women so obsessed with reading them.
That of course was a rabbit hole of epic proportions, just like the letters, as one entry led to the next, and I couldn’t wait to see what was up ahead.
“Hey. Ready to talk?” Josh asked.
I jumped as the sound of his voice yanked me out of the roaring twenties in Mudville and back to my modern Manhattan office. “Sure. Your call is over all ready?”
“Already?” He laughed. “I was on it for almost an hour.”
“Oh. Okay. Yeah. I’m ready.” I glanced at the time on my computer and as he’d said, an hour had passed.
An hour, at my desk, basically cyber stalking the town of Mudville and a woman who’d been dead for twenty-years, all while missing Bethany as I barely controlled myself from texting her again.
That’s when I knew for sure I’d never be the same. I’d never be happy sitting here when I wanted to be there. That all meant one thing—I was good and truly fucked. And I had no clue what to do about it.
TWENTY-NINE
Bethany
BRANDON: So, what are you wearing?
I laughed out loud at the text that ended with a winking emoji, startling old lady Trout and her husband seated at a table sipping their third free refill of coffee after devouring the one single honey bun they’d shared.
Turning away, I typed in a reply.
BETHANY: What kind of question is that? LOL
His response was instant.
BRANDON: It’s my first attempt at sexting. Give me a break.
I couldn’t help my smile. I’d never sexted anyone either but to hear Brandon hadn’t made me extremely happy. I drew in a breath and considered my words.
It was times like this that I wished I had Harper around to help me craft the perfect response.
Since I didn’t and I was alone—save for the Trouts, who sure as heck were not going to be helping me with this task—I’d have to wing it on my own.
BETHANY: To answer your question I’m wearing a Honey Buns—it’s like an orgasm in your mouth T-shirt.
BRANDON: If you aren’t selling those T-shirts in the shop yet you need to. Either way, I’m buying one of both sayings!
I smiled. This was what I loved about him. We could go from dirty talk—or our pitiful attempt at it—to business and marketing in one smooth move.
Love. Yeah, I’d been thinking that word a lot lately about so many things regarding Brandon.
How I loved how he was manly enough he wasn’t afraid to tear up over Rose’s letters. How I loved how he lost himself in the moment and gave one hundred percent, whether that was setting up Muddy’s house or making french fries for my friends. How he barely ever looked at his cell when he was here over the weekend with me.
And how when he looked at me, and when he made love to me, it was like I was the only woman in the world.
We were getting close to another weekend. Would he be here again? I didn’t want to ask, but I couldn’t stand not knowing.
Curiosity won out. Or maybe just lust because I so wanted to see him again. Lust was an L-word I could embrace without worrying. That other one, yeah, that one made me worry a little.
BETHANY: You taking a trip upstate this weekend to visit your diner?
There. I’d kept it casual. Just one Mudville business owner chatting with another.
Yeah, right.
BRANDON: I plan on it. Why? Would you want to see me if I do?
My eyes widened. He was teasing. At least I hoped he was just teasing. It was so hard to tell over text.
Who had decided texting was preferable to calling? Life—and love—was confusing enough as it was.
Crud. There was that word again.
How should I play this? Should I make a joke? Being serious seemed too, well, serious.
Darn it, I needed Harper, or Red, or somebody—anybody—
on Bluetooth in my ear advising me on this stuff.
At this point I’d even take one of the Morgan brothers. Being men, they’d know how to answer Brandon.
Unfortunately, my only options in the shop remained the Trouts.
Drawing in a breath, I paused with my thumbs poised over the keyboard. I typed in one word then second guessed it a dozen times. Finally, I got an idea.
BETHANY: Maybe . . . Will there be fries?
BRANDON: I can guarantee it!
I smiled. I’d made the right call.
Things seemed to be going well, so I started to get a little cocky. A bit bolder. I typed in a reply that had me smiling as I entered it. I could only hope it did the same for him.
BETHANY: It’s a date. And no need to impose on Agnes. You can sleep at my house. The sofa opens into a bed.
BRANDON: We’ll see about that sofa part.
The emoji with one brow raised high that he’d added had me laughing, until another text from him flew onto my screen.
BRANDON: Gotta go. Meeting. Talk later.
BETHANY: Later.
I sent my reply as fast as I could so he’d get it before he skittered off to his meeting.
Not that I knew exactly what he did that he’d be meeting about. He’d explained what his company was but it all sounded like a bunch of numbers and statistical analysis marketing mumbo jumbo to me.
T-shirts with clever sayings and maintaining a Facebook page for the bakery was about as deep as I got into marketing. And the T-shirts were Harper’s idea.
Otherwise, the most I did on my own was donate cookies to the Chamber of Commerce’s annual dinner and give a gift certificate to be raffled off. No ads. No demographic analytics.
Brandon was on a whole other threshold. One I didn’t need to be on. A Manhattan level, while I was happy here on my Mudville level—as long as he came to visit me here.
But that was the problem. I wanted him here full time. But what would he do here? Run the diner? That wasn’t him. His passion was this—whatever the heck he did at his company.
At least he was only three hours away and not across the country. And he’d be here in just a couple of days for the whole weekend.
That made me happy. Though I was less happy when I remembered I needed to clean the house and make sure the sheets were freshly laundered before Saturday.
I was reaching for a pad of scratch paper and a pen to make a To Do list when another text came through. I jumped on the phone, expecting it to be from Brandon, but it wasn’t. Boone’s name appeared on the display.
BOONE: Can you get to the farm stand NOW?! Important!
My eyes widened. What had happened? Was there a fire? Was someone hurt?
I spun around and glanced at the big antique school clock hanging on the wall of the shop. Adele would be here in five minutes. She was never early for her shift but she was also never late.
BETHANY: I can leave
in 5 minutes. What’s wrong?
BOONE: Nothing. Just get here as soon as you can!!!
That was a lot of exclamation points. Of course, Boone was young and easily excited. I could only hope that was the extent of it and there wasn’t anything seriously the matter.
Adele walked in at two-fifty-nine on the dot. I had my apron off and my car keys and cell in my hand by the time she made her way to the counter.
“I have to run out quick.”
“Okay. No problem. Anything going on I should know about?” she asked, looking surprised I was ready to sprint out the door but not questioning it.
Besides the Trouts trying to break the world record for the most free refills consumed in an afternoon, I had nothing to relay.
“Nope. Text me if you need me.” I was out the door and to my car in seconds. I covered the two miles to the farm stand in probably two minutes flat, speeding past the thirty-five mile per hour sign with just a little bit of guilt.
I didn’t like being kept in the dark on a good day. Hints and half-truths made me insane. And don’t get me started on vague-booking—posting vague things on Facebook. I wanted to throttle people who did that.
So Boone and his text had me ready to crawl out of my skin—or at least ready to speed down Main Street and out of the village proper to get to the farm stand.
If this turned out to be nothing, I was going to smack that boy so hard.
But if it turned out to be something . . . I didn’t know what I’d do then.
I spotted Red’s truck first. Easy to do since Red’s truck was actually red and hard to miss.
Whatever was happening, she was here for it. But that wasn’t cause for alarm, right? She was dating Cash. She was here a lot.
What was odd, and possibly worth worrying about, were the sheer number of cars and trucks parked here. And that one single news van.
WBNG was here. Why?
I swung the car into the lot and skidded to a stop in the gravel. I was out of my vehicle in seconds, slamming the door without bothering to pull the keys out of the ignition.
“What’s going on?” I asked the first person I came to. I didn’t even know who they were.
